Talking to your kids about sexting
Sexting is most likely to have negative consequences when the person sending the sext has been pressured into doing it.
Sexting is most likely to have negative consequences when the person sending the sext has been pressured into doing it.
This November 3-7, thousands of students, educators, parents and community organizations will join MediaSmarts and the Canadian Teachers’ Federation (CTF) in marking Canada’s 9th annual Media Literacy Week.
In this lesson, students are introduced to the idea that “hot” emotional states such as anger or excitement can make it harder for them to control how they act. They also discuss the concept of empathy and look at the ways in which digital communication can make it harder to feel empathy for other people. Students then read scenarios that portray two sides of an online conflict and consider how to resolve them, using their discussion to build a list of tools for emotional management and conflict resolution online. Finally, students create a media product that explains and reminds them of one of those tools.
You may not realize it, but you have a lot of power when you’re online: you can cheer people up, make them laugh, and help to make your school, your town or even the whole world a better place. The flip side is that what you do can make things worse, too. That’s why you have to think about what you say and do online, and try your best to do the right thing.
Doing the right thing online mostly comes down to the three R’s of respect: respect people’s privacy, respect people’s feelings and respect people’s property.
Canadian teens love to socialize online, and they especially love to share photos.
Making Your Voice Heard: A Media Toolkit for Youth is designed to help young people understand how the news industry works, why youth stereotyping happens and how they can access media to get positive youth voices and stories heard.
February 10 is Safer Internet Day (#SID2015): an annual international event organized by InSafe to help promote safer and more responsible use of online technologies, especially by young people. MediaSmarts and Facebook want you to help us mark the day by reminding youth to “think before they share” online!
In this lesson students will identify and classify their own interactions with the Internet and will engage in a collaborative critical thinking activity that will have them examine the Internet from a variety of perspectives.
Level: Grades 4 to 6
About the Author: This lesson was written for MediaSmarts by Ethan Anderson
Duration: 1-2 hours
Students are introduced to Wikipedia, the user-edited online encyclopedia, and given an overview of its strengths and weaknesses as a research source.